Hosea 6:8
in Hosea 6Gilead is a city of evildoers, tracked with footprints of blood.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity; it is stained with blood.
KJV
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood.
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This verse in Hosea 6
Commentary
9 notes on this verseGalaad a city of idolaters, supplanted by blood, and like the throats of robbers (or "the city of a robber") for both readings are possible. The Septuagint: "There Galad despised me, a city that is devoted to vanity, and disturbs the water, and your strength, O violent men."
This site's exposition
Gilead is a city
on Hosea 6:8-10
Gilead is named a city of workers of iniquity, polluted with blood, and the bench reads the charge against a specific place east of the Jordan long associated with violence going back to Jephthah's era, a reputation the prophet revives rather than invents. The company of priests is likened to troops of robbers lying in wait for a traveler, murdering by consent on the very roads pilgrims traveled toward the shrines, the older commentators taking this either literally, of priests turned to banditry, or as a figure for the spiritual murder of leading the people astray, the readings named together. I have seen an horrible thing in the house of Israel returns the whoredom charge of chapters 1-3 and 4 to the nation once more, Ephraim's defilement stated as a settled fact the Lord himself has witnessed.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening4 voices
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity,.... The chief city in the land of Gilead, which lay beyond Jordan, inhabited by Gad and Reuben, and the half tribe of Manasseh; and so belonged to the ten tribes, whose sins are here particularly observed. It had its name from the country, or the country from that, or both from the mountain of the same name.
A city - A city full of notorious transgressors, the inhabitants though Levites and priests, work all manner of wickedness. With blood - Murders committed there.
Note, Those who are disposed to turn to God themselves should do all they can to excite, and engage, and encourage others to return to him. What it is they engage to do: " Come, and let us return to the Lord,
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — odd-straight-quotes
Particularly it is polluted with blood, as if that were a sin which the wicked Levites were in a special manner guilty of. In popish countries the clergy are observed to be the most bloody persecutors. Or, as it was a city of refuge, by abusing the power it had to judge of murders it became polluted with blood.
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity - In this place Jacob and Laban made their covenant, and set up a heap of stones, which was called Galeed, the heap of testimony; and most probably idolatry was set up here. Perhaps the very heap became the object of superstitious adoration.
2 more voices on this verse
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
Gilead . . . city--probably Ramoth-gilead, metropolis of the hilly region beyond Jordan, south of the Jabbok, known as "Gilead" (1Ki 4:13; compare Ge 31:21-25). work iniquity-- (Ho 12:11). polluted with blood--"marked with blood-traces" [MAURER].
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity - If we regard “Gilead,” (as it elsewhere is,) as the country beyond Jordan, where the two tribes and a half dwelt, this will mean that the whole land was banded in one, as one city of evil-doers. It had an unity, but of evil. As the whole world has been pictured as divided between “the city of God” and the city of the devil, consisting respectively of the children of God and the children of the devil; so the whole of Gilead may be represented as one city, whose inhabitants had one occupation in common, to work evil. Some think that there was a city so called, although not mentioned elsewhere in Holy Scripture, near that Mount Gilead, dear to the memory of Israel, because God there protected their forefather Jacob. Some think that it was Ramoth in Gilead , which God appointed as “a city of refuge,” and which, consequently, became a city of Levites and priests Jos 21:38. Here, where God had preserved the life of their forefather, and, in him, had preserved them; here, where He had commanded the innocent shedder of blood to be saved; here, where he had appointed those to dwell, whom He had hallowed to Himself, all was turned to the exact contrary. It, which God had hallowed, was become “a city of workers of iniquity,” i. e., of people, whose habits and custom was to work iniquity. […]
The words behind it
6 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| גִּלְעָ֕ד | gilad | Gilead | H1568 → | |
| קִרְיַ֖ת | kiryat | [is] a town of | H7151 → | |
| פֹּ֣עֲלֵי | poalei | doers of | H6466 → | |
| אָ֑וֶן | ʾaven | wickedness | H205 → | 77 times |
| עֲקֻבָּ֖ה | ʾakubah | tracked | H6121 → | |
| מִדָּֽם׃ | midam | from blood | H1818 → | 360 times |
גִּלְעָ֕דGilead
giladH1568 →
קִרְיַ֖ת[is] a town of
kiryatH7151 →
פֹּ֣עֲלֵיdoers of
poaleiH6466 →
אָ֑וֶןwickedness
ʾavenH205 →77 times
עֲקֻבָּ֖הtracked
ʾakubahH6121 →
מִדָּֽם׃from blood
midamH1818 →360 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Hosea 5:1“Hear this, O priests! Take heed, O house of Israel! Give ear, O royal house! For this judgment is against you because you have been a snare at Mizpah, a net spread out on…
it leads to
- Hosea 9:8
The prophet is Ephraim’s watchman, along with my God, yet the snare of the fowler lies on all his paths. Hostility is in the house of his God!
- Hosea 6:9
Like raiders who lie in ambush, so does a band of priests; they murder on the way to Shechem; surely they have committed atrocities.
- Micah 7:2
The godly man has perished from the earth; there is no one upright among men. They all lie in wait for blood; they hunt one another with a net.
- Habakkuk 1:15–17
The foe pulls all of them up with a hook; he catches them in his dragnet, and gathers them in his fishing net; so he rejoices gladly.
- Hosea 9:8
Through
Psalms 59:2Deliver me from workers of iniquity, and save me from men of bloodshed.
it leads to
- Psalms 139:19
O God, that You would slay the wicked— away from me, you bloodthirsty men—
- Psalms 139:19
Through
Hosea 12:11Is there iniquity in Gilead? They will surely come to nothing. Do they sacrifice bulls in Gilgal? Indeed, their altars will be heaps of stones in the furrows of the field.
it leads to
- Hosea 4:15
Though you prostitute yourself, O Israel, may Judah avoid such guilt! Do not journey to Gilgal, do not go up to Beth-aven, and do not swear on oath, ‘As surely as the LORD lives!’
- Hosea 8:11
Though Ephraim multiplied the altars for sin, they became his altars for sinning.
- Hosea 9:15
All their evil appears at Gilgal, for there I hated them. I will drive them from My house for the wickedness of their deeds. I will no longer love them; all their leaders are…
- Hosea 4:15
About Hosea
This page draws on 9 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Edward Bouverie Pusey, The Minor Prophets: A Commentary; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Hosea 6:8; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.